GOP sees no reason to cheer jobs report

Oct. 5, 2012
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House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va. / Steve Helber, AP

by Paul Singer, USA TODAY

by Paul Singer, USA TODAY

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House Majority Leader Eric Cantor and other Republicans downplayed the significance of a drop in the national unemployment rate announced Friday, noting that the nation is still suffering a shortage of jobs.

The monthly jobs report released Friday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics said the unemployment rate had dropped to 7.8%, the lowest rate since January 2009.

"While today's unemployment report offered some encouraging news, it simply isn't good enough," Cantor, R-Va., said in a statement. "7.8% unemployment should not be cause for celebration. Millions have given up looking for a job, and left the workforce. The workforce participation rate hasn't been this low since Jimmy Carter was president. America needs a new direction."

GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney echoed this notion. "This is not what a real recovery looks like," he said in a statement released shortly after the jobs report. "We created fewer jobs in September than in August,and fewer jobs in August than in July, and we've lost over 600,000 manufacturing jobs since President Obama took office. If not for all the people who have simply dropped out of the labor force, the real unemployment rate would be closer to 11%."

On Twitter, some critics even suggested the new numbers may not be accurate.

Former GE CEO Jack Welch suggested in a tweet Friday morning that the Obama administration has manipulated unemployment numbers to take attention away from the president's poor debate performance.